Teen Science Cafe: Getting Serious About the Sun

Friday, November 03, 2017

6:00pm - 7:00pm

A solar prominence erupts in August 2012, as captured by the Solar Dynamics Observatory.

The Sun is our closest star and from a distance it seems unchanging. The Sun is not a calm object though. A close look at the surface gives it the impression of boiling soup. We can see hot gas trapped in giant magnetic loops arching over its surface. We also see occasional, highly energetic eruptions blast from its surface. The Sun interacts with the Earth in familiar ways, such as producing colorful auroras, and occasionally also produces dramatic far reaching effects, such as the Quebec Blackout in 1989. This Teen Science Cafe will highlight some of the common and uncommon events produced by the Sun.

Dr. Patrick Treuthardt is Assistant Head of the Astronomy and Astrophysics Research Lab at the NC Museum of Natural Sciences. He obtained his PhD from the University of Alabama and has been a visiting researcher at the University of Oulu in Oulu, Finland, as well as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. His research focuses on understanding the different forms and structures that make up galaxies and their connection to the supermassive black holes they harbor in their nucleus, as well as the enormous halo of dark matter they reside in.